Now, Clergerie is back is the limelight, with Mouret at the helm as Creative Director. In Hong Kong to showcase the collection at Lane Crawford, he talked me through some of the new styles. Turns out, they’re just as appealing to me now as they were the first time round. So much so I have some on order. A pair of silver caged sandals, and a snakeskin detailed T bar pair will be winging their way to me soon. Merci Monsiuer Mouret, and welcome back to my closet, Clergerie!

KOTUR’s debut collection in Hong Kong’s uber chic department store, Lane Crawford.

Our Fall 2010 collection debuted this season in Hong Kong’s Lane Crawford department store, with Fiona instore to personally introduce the collection.

No slavish follower of runway fads, British-born Sarah makes her wardrobe of Alaia classics and timeless biker jackets work hard for her, whether at home in Hong Kong or jet-setting the international front rows.

Her friends call her a magician, but I like to think of her as more of a technician, piecing together components to create a masterpiece.

As you would expect from the fashion director for the Lane Crawford group of department stores in Asia, her product knowledge is encyclopedic, with the contents of her make-up bag reeled off without hesitation and with full specification – brand, shade and size.

A curator of fashion, Sarah is master. She also offers unexpected revelations about her addiction to cheap chocolate, her knitting habit, and her weakness for all creatures great and small…

KOTUR: What’s in your make-up bag?
Sarah: Oh that’s simple. I’m very minimal on makeup. I wear very little – I never wear mascara, ever. Clue de peu foundation, Mac blusher, I wear a Chanel nude lipstick and I wear Giorgio Armani eyeshadow

KOTUR: Do you have a favorite purse or bag?
Sarah: Yes – I have to say the bag I use the most is an Hermes clutch. I use it for evening and for day. When I’m on a business trip, I have a car 24/7, so the car becomes my office where I keep files and everything. I don’t want them ruining my handbag or ruining my back.

KOTUR: Do you have a beauty secret?
Sarah: Yesterday I bought my first bottle of La Prairie Caviar Luxe cream. I’m literally on day 1, and by day 30 I expect to look… oooh… 35?

KOTUR: How would your female friends describe your style?
Sarah: Very eclectic, but mostly they’re shocked because I’ve got fewer clothes than any of my friends have – they call me a magician. I have a very strict wardrobe – I’m the expert at mixing and matching… it never looks like I wear anything twice.

KOTUR: What’s the most treasured item in your wardrobe?
Sarah: It’s a family signet ring, a very large signet ring which was unusual for a woman, it comes from about 1720, so it was a great great great great grandmother, and she was a very bold dresser.

KOTUR: Is there anything in your wardrobe you should get rid of but can’t?
Sarah: Never – everything I have in my wardrobe I wear. My wardrobe works very, very hard for me. I tend to buy the same thing in a couple of colors. The biker jacket, for example, has been in my wardrobe for 30 odd years, but I can always find an excuse to buy another one – the weight of it, the color, the cut, the proportion…

KOTUR: What do you never leave home without?
Sarah: Wearing scent. Perfume is very important to me, which is why I’ve got a very large nose – for a reason. I never leave home without wearing my perfume which is one of 3 brands: Jo Malone Lime Basil and Mandarin, the other is Bulgari and Clarins in the red bottle. I never walk out of the house with out scent on – I feel naked.

KOTUR: Have you ever worn anything you are now embarrassed by?
Sarah: I think my hair embarrassed me, looking back, at the 80s with that curly perm, the whole Flashdance thing. I certainly look at that 80’s perm Bananarama thing going on with the mousse, and it’s pretty terrifying…

KOTUR: How high is too high a heel?
Sarah: Oh no such thing, but I will never be uncomfortable. Anna Dello Russo said fashion should be uncomfortable, but I am in the school that absolutely anything I wear that if I have to fiddle with it, or if I’m mincing around in pain, it’s just not going to happen.

KOTUR: How old is too old for jeans?
Sarah: Never, never. My mother is 80 and unbelievably chic, she is my style icon. The chicest woman you will ever know, beautiful, beautiful woman – she’s very much like the Duchess of Devonshire, she’s a very tall and regal woman, she wears jeans. We went out and bought a pair of J Brand dark, dark blue jeans and she looks incredible in them.

KOTUR: What is your most recent purchase?
Sarah: Very easy… yet another Alaia dress. My first independent purchase, with my first salary at 17 was an Alaia dress. I saved up and went to Paris. Absolutely I still have it and wear it. It’s the one brand and time when I never ever look at a price tag, because it is irrelevant to me in that respect – it defies trend, it defies season, it defies anything you would normally question “should I pay this much for this or that?” because I’ve never, never not worn my Alaias to death…

KOTUR: Can you judge a book by its cover?
Sarah: Never, but I am an extremely good judge of character. I guess it’s because my grandmother was a psychic, and it’s something I’m never wrong on…

KOTUR: What’s your greatest extravagance?
Sarah: My greatest extravagance, I suppose, is my inability to say no to an animal in distress. Every year, there are more animals in my house – literally we now have 2 dogs, 5 cats, and I lavish my mutts…

KOTUR: Do you have a cheap thrill?
Sarah: When I say I like chocolate, I only like cheap chocolate…Cadbury’s.

KOTUR: Who or what would you like to be reincarnated as in your next life?
Sarah: A really loved dog! A dog in a family that is really crazy about me, because that would be a fabulous life…

KOTUR: Yes or no to a nip and a tuck?
Sarah: I’m a no to Botox, but will I have surgery… hell yes!

KOTUR: What part of your body would you like to change?
Sarah: I would like straight hair that I don’t have to blow-dry.

KOTUR: Do you have a favorite Kotur bag?
Sarah: Yes, it’s my feathers… it’s really so chic. Again, because I’m so understated in a lot of the things I wear, I love a clutch bag and people say ‘ooh where did you get that?’ and it’s always in my bag in every trip.

KOTUR: On a scale of one-to-ten, how good looking are you?
Um… I’m not good looking, I stand out in a crowd – people remember me. I’m not a classic beauty, I’m different… and how do you rate that?

FK: What’s in your make-up bag?….
Anna Dello Russo: Not much…I don’t wear much makeup. The older I get, the less I wear. People think the opposite, but makeup makes you look older. On me, I look like a drag queen. You have to have good face – perfect lips, perfect eyes – if you want to wear makeup, otherwise, it looks like a mask. It’s like a drawing, it has to be perfectly done. For me, my face is not so good, but my body is incredible…

FM: Do you have a beauty secret?
ADR: I always like tanned – my wish is to be Giselle. You know this kind of girl, like beautiful Brazilian. Because I am from Southern Italy, sunny girl, I get tanned or wear tanned makeup. But real beauty comes from the inside – see this color (pointing to her cheek) – this is the perfect color. I do so much yoga and swim everyday, and that makes me the best color skin… there is no make-up to create this color skin.

FM: What do you wear on a fat day?
ADR: What is this? A day you don’t feel so good? I do the opposite. If I feel bad, I will get dressed up, because it makes me lift my spirit. The more I feel bad, the more I prove myself in the opposite way: I put [on] a high heel, I take a short dress…

FM: How do your friends describe your style?
ADR: Like a transvestite… You know, 10 years ago I used to go clubbing, always clubbing, clubbing – to gay clubs. One night, during dancing, I hear “I know the truth, you are woman transvestite” and I said, “I tell you the truth, I am transvestite like you…” and we laugh and he says to his friends “I knew it!”, and every Saturday I would go to the club because they all want to see my look…

FM: What’s the most treasured item in your wardrobe?
ADR: I collect clothes…it’s not about this piece, another piece…all of them are a treasury. It’s an entire collection….

FM: Name your desert island essentials?
ADR: Lots of stuff… I will need a camel to carry my collection. No – LOTS of camels!

FM: Is there anything in your wardrobe you should get rid of?
ADR: Are you crazy?! Tell you a story, my nieces are female, of course – 4 nieces… Every one comes to me and asks, “Will you please leave me your entire clothes when you die?” – “I will, I will, I will, I will” I say, but very finally I think, I cannot give to anyone. Because, you know, it’s my full life. I think I will be Tutankhamun. One day, I will put everything with me in a vault, a cave.

FM: How high is too high a heel?
ADR: I can tell you, not too high, because my favorite is 11mm, without a platform, otherwise you cannot walk like natural, or in a sexy way, which I hate.

FM: How old is too old for jeans?
ADR: I want to tell you, jeans is not my favorite piece. When I used to be young, everybody used to wear jeans. “Listen, I give you my pair of jeans, you give me your grandmother’s jacket”, because, even then, I was always looking for luxury pieces.
Of course, jeans is part of our world. If you are skinny, if you have a beautiful body, you can wear it anytime. It depends about the fit. For me, jeans needs to fit very well.

FM: How old is too old for a mini?
ADR: How young [are] your legs?

FM: Who would you like to be reincarnated as?
ADR: Lady Gaga – I would love to be a singer, a famous pop star.

FM: Yes or no to nip and tuck?
ADR: Oh yes, absolutely. I am transvestite, I can’t live without…

FM: Which of the various KOTUR bags is your favorite?
ADR: I like the little clutches, the one with stars – like Napoleon!

FM: What do you wear to bed alone?
ADR: It depends on the season… but I always sleep with my dog, Cucciolina.

FM: How about with your boyfriend?
ADR: Sexy stuff…I cannot even tell you because this is secret….

FM: How would you like to be remembered?
ADR: Like an internet icon. People told me that, they say “you are an internet icon”. I love it, because it’s another life.